Since it is THAT time of the year, we headed to DuQuion, Illinois to visit Shane's 80 year old grandmother, his uncle, and the youngest cousin in the family who is three and a half years old. The few days we spent with them were filled with great stories of family history and cookies baked into the night.

It is great to spend one on one time with Shane's Grandmother Lois, whom I have only ever met at large family gatherings and rushed circumstances. This is the first time we ever really got to have a conversation, and the first time since he was a kid that Shane visits the area. We both leave with a new understanding of family history and a new admiration for Grandma.


We then headed to Marion, Illinois to visit Shane's younger cousin Amy and her husband Tim. They are a young, hardworking couple that gives new hope for the future. Tim treats us to his famous deer chili and Amy and I bake cupcakes from a King Arthur's Flour mix, and make the homemade frosting recipe on the box:

1 pint Heavy Whipping Cream
2/3 cup Semi-sweet chocolate chips
Bring cream to a boil, pour over chips in bowl, let sit for 5 minutes and stir. Leaving it as is makes a great glaze, but we chose to let ours cool and then whip it for about 10 minutes for fluffy and light whipped cream frosting. It was delicious!

Needless to say, we were stuffed with chili, cupcakes and sweet tea before drifting off in the spare bedroom. This was a wonderful few days truly full of Christmas Spirit -- in the TRUEST sense of the word - Warmth from family, good food, and fond memories. Yeash! I am beginning to believe my paranoia that Uncle Donald REALLY WAS injecting us with Christmas Spirit while we were sleeping!

Now we are en route to Little Rock, where we will attend a the West Memphis 3 march.